The music department is hosting the Midwest Collaborative Piano Competition at 9 a.m., Saturday in the Recital Hall in Doudna Fine Arts Center.

The event is free and open to the public.

This is the second year of the Midwest Collaborative Piano Competition; the annual event draws young collaborative pianists from the Midwest region to Eastern for a day of music, and the champion will win $500.

Each pianist will perform a collaborative work with another instrument of his or her choice.

On the day of the competition, candidates and their partner will perform their pieces for the judge in a master class setting. After receiving coaching from the judges, they will have a chance to give a second performance.

The 2015 competition judges will be music professors Jonathan Bowman and Paul Johnston.

Bowman is one of the professors in charge of the competition and said there is a lot of piano competition.

“There aren’t any competitions about that skill of, as a piano player supporting another instrument to helping them sound good and kind of having a dialogue between the two parts.”

Bowman said Eastern is qualified to host this music competition.

“EIU is such a great place and the music department in particular has such a amazing facility, practice room, the instruments, this competition create a way to get people to come to our campus, see what great stuffs we got here,” Bowman said.

Bowman said whoever wins is going to be someone who works hard so they can know what their partner is doing and be in sync; he said the most important aspect is to be able to communicate and express themselves through the music.

Bowman said to fit the standard of a champion, they must not only learn how to play the music but learn to communicate as well.

“Whoever wins it must be someone who works very hard, so they may got all of the physical aspects of the music down. They know to push the right keys, they know what their partner was doing, they can think together,” Bowman said. “But more important than that, is they are able to communicate or express something wonderful through the music.”

Qian Cheng can be reached at 581-2812 or qcheng@eiu.edu